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“So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

theguardian.com

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Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#171

Post by gcheong »

spydum wrote: post #93
_abattoir wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When most people say "bullshit job", it seems to me like they really mean "job that could be solved by a well-built machine". Farming used to be a bullshit job until we built gigantic combines and automated watering systems and agricultural data storage systems, and now our farming problems are electronic, not logistic. (except for water, but that's another story.) So for the example of an actuary, ideally their job…

> The moral of the story is we should automate jobs that people don't like doing. who decides what jobs people dont like doing? Just because you might not like being a taxi driver, farmer, actuary, etc, doesnt mean you should demolish the job with automation -- plenty of people find these jobs provide a fulfilling workday and are passionate about them. any automation there would deprive them of doing them as a profes…

" how would we feel if tomorrow, we woke up and some guys from stanford published new research on AI which can automagically produce working software given a set of requirements -- and they give it away for free." I would personally feel great because that would mean I could focus on getting the requirements part right instead of slogging back and forth through build software that almost but doesn't quite get the requirements right and then perhaps I would have enough time to work on extending the system to being able to capture requirements from users as well.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#172

Post by rayiner »

wpietri wrote: post #151
rayiner wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> * Private equity CEOs Like 'sama? Remember, the whole world of VC is a subcategory of private equity. > * Lobbyists Lobbyists are the ones that tell the government that if they pass the new environmental regulation, the coal plant employing 300 workers will have to close. Other lobbyists tell the government that if they don't pass the new environmental regulation, that coal plant will impose tens of millions of dol…

Lobbyists are people who tell officials whatever they are paid to say. Each individual lobbyist is presumably useful to the person paying them. But that doesn't mean that they are societally useful. If we had exactly zero of them, legislators would still learn things and pass laws. They might need to hire more researchers. Or they might not, because there'd be less distortion to sort through. The reason company X nee…

> Lobbyists are people who tell officials whatever they are paid to say

Lobbyists are paid to advocate the viewpoints of their clients, but their clients are people: businesses, organizations, and individuals with a stake in the society.

> If we had exactly zero of them, legislators would still learn things and pass laws. They might need to hire more researchers.

Sure, you can move that function into the bureaucracy. Instead of lobbyists presenting information on behalf of clients, you could have technocrats that were part of the bureaucracy. But someone has to present to the legislators the impact a proposal will have on various stakeholders--it would be a bad thing if nobody did that work.

And it's not clear that moving the research function into the bureaucracy would be a good thing. The benefit of the lobbying system is that it's adversarial--Google's lobbyists can attack the evidence and reasoning of Sony's lobbyists. But who attacks the evidence of the faceless unelected technocrat? Non-adversarial processes have failure modes too.

Also, it's not like without lobbyists big corporations wouldn't have influence over government, or even less influence. Companies like mass retailers, oil companies, coal companies, etc, will always have tremendous pull because they employ lots of people or control products vital to the economy. Companies like Google merely have money, rather than hundreds of thousands of voters' livelihoods as bargaining chips. It's a huge credit of the lobbying system that such companies can have as much influence over government as they do.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#173

Post by rayiner »

collyw wrote: post #155
crdoconnor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Most people who criticize "bullshit jobs" simply lack the perspective to see how these jobs are critically important for society. Ok, so that's one that you cherry picked. How about these? * Private equity CEOs * Lobbyists * PR researchers * Telemarketers * Bailiffs Tell us how the world would be worse off without them. You could argue that some of these are doing actual harm to society, actually.

I have thought this recently. The people who get richest often are the ones fucking up things. The oil industry for example is making a mess of the environment, but many people rich. Like wise the guy who invented tetra packs is rich, but what a waste - a plastic carton for every litre of milk? Better off when we were recycling glass.

> The oil industry for example is making a mess of the environment, but many people rich.

They also make our mega-sprawl suburbs possible. It's a cop-out to pretend like oil companies aren't getting rich giving people what they want.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#174

Post by diminoten »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #169
roymurdock wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Useful is such a relative word. Telemarketing is useful in some way to the person who employs the telemarketer. Otherwise he/she wouldn't pay someone to do it. It's also useful to the person earning the salary, who then spends their salary consuming in the economy. Not everyone is lucky/brave enough to pursue what they are truly passionate about. Finally, even if the job doesn't generate any sales, it's still redistr…

Useful for humanity. Because "useful for employee" or "useful for employer" are bad measures that allow really stupid things to exist. This job is based on lying and/or deceiving to people to trick them into buying somethng. Whoever is paying for it is actively hurting other humans. In a way it's worse than bullshit - it's a malicious job.

Are you implying that there is no place for malicious jobs in society?

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#175

Post by cssmoo »

zo1 wrote: post #112
cssmoo wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. It was good for me and it was good for the other person too. Why? Because it enforces society's moral standards upon everyone. If there is no common ground it descends into anarchy because if someone owes me £1500 I'm going to pay £200 to smash his kneecaps if there wasn't a court and bailiff option...

I'm sorry, but if you think that is what a state-less society will turn to, then it says more about you than it does about other people. I, for example, don't not smash people's kneecaps because it's "against the law", just like most other individuals that inhabit this society. On the other hand, you seem to be under the misconception that there can be no "common ground" in a society without a state-mandated "common…

Oh give me a break. This isn't star trek and you're not Picard.

Three simple words derail all idealism in your post:

Corruption. Power. Poverty.

You don't smash people's knees in because you've never had to so you can solicit a payment that you entered a contract and need to eat for the next couple of weeks and you approach the authorities and they've been paid off or don't give a shit.

Humans don't look after each other very well, even if you do.

I simply admit that smashing kneecaps is a valid recourse in a world with the above concerns.

You might want to live in Brazil or South Africa for a bit.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#176

Post by zo1 »

rayiner wrote: post #166
zo1 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>" I'm curious, have you ever lived in a country without strong centralized law enforcement? I have. It sucks. " Did that country also have laws against carrying firearms? How about laws that prevent individuals from defending themselves? E.g. Castle-doctrine, self-defense, private security firms, etc. You may hail it as proof that without a state, safety is not ensured. But I see it as an unfortunate limbo position…

> But I see it as an unfortunate limbo position where there is no protection provided by the state to the inhabitants, and there are also legal/state obstacles in place to prevent private individuals from performing that function. Private security can't replace the state. In South Africa, the rich can hire private security because the state exists as a backstop to prevent security companies from turning on their clie…

>"We have tested it. In Somalia and Yemen and Pakistan. Feudal Europe. States didn't always exist. They arose as defense mechanisms to the power of organized groups to terrorize the majority with violence."

Oh wow, I didn't know Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan were once, or currently are state-less societies? And yes, casual google searching yielded no fruitful results. Except for Somalia, which is a well-known failed-state that that's recently been in a brutal civil war. To compare it to the mild/incremental ideas that I propose/suggest is intellectually low-belt.

>"Private security can't replace the state. In South Africa, the rich can hire private security[..]"

I know it doesn't suit your preconceived notions about "private security" but security in South Africa is actually very affordable. Not that the poor get much "security" in civilized nations for free from the state, but that's a different discussion. You'd be surprised at how effective money is when a group of like-minded individuals spend it on their little neighborhood or slice of land.

>"In South Africa, the rich can hire private security because the state exists as a backstop to prevent security companies from turning on their clients. Without the state, any organization effective enough in the exercise of violence to provide real security has every incentive to simply enslave its clients."

Again, it's as if you're completely side-stepping what I'm saying/proposing with pre-made knee-jerk responses. Enslaving individuals would never be allowed to exist on a large scale in a digital/connected society. But besides that, I suggest slow, incremental shifts towards "more privatized" security that is not hindered by the state. That is the big problem when discussing these issues with "statists", you don't even make any room for the possibility of attempting these ideas, or trying milder alternatives. Alternatives that could signal individuals that 'hey, maybe we don't need the state'. Almost as if you fear competition.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#177

Post by TeMPOraL »

diminoten wrote: post #174
TeMPOraL wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Useful for humanity. Because "useful for employee" or "useful for employer" are bad measures that allow really stupid things to exist. This job is based on lying and/or deceiving to people to trick them into buying somethng. Whoever is paying for it is actively hurting other humans. In a way it's worse than bullshit - it's a malicious job.

Are you implying that there is no place for malicious jobs in society?

I am. Before someone brings up the military - you can say that armed forces are built on malice, but the harm is at least directed towards other societies. Telemarketing is basically hurting members of your own.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#178

Post by IndianAstronaut »

_abattoir wrote: post #19
qq66 wrote: post #6

Most people who criticize "bullshit jobs" simply lack the perspective to see how these jobs are critically important for society. Take the list from the article itself, one of the "bullshit jobs" listed is actuary. Well, without actuaries, insurance would not be priced correctly, and would be prohibitively expensive or too cheap and insurance companies would go out of business. Either way, insurance would be less ava…

When most people say "bullshit job", it seems to me like they really mean "job that could be solved by a well-built machine". Farming used to be a bullshit job until we built gigantic combines and automated watering systems and agricultural data storage systems, and now our farming problems are electronic, not logistic. (except for water, but that's another story.) So for the example of an actuary, ideally their job…

Automating actuaries should already have happened. Most actuaries will know some programming and nowadays you cannot get hired unless you can use VBA at a minimum or C++.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#179

Post by egypturnash »

qq66 wrote: post #6

Most people who criticize "bullshit jobs" simply lack the perspective to see how these jobs are critically important for society. Take the list from the article itself, one of the "bullshit jobs" listed is actuary. Well, without actuaries, insurance would not be priced correctly, and would be prohibitively expensive or too cheap and insurance companies would go out of business. Either way, insurance would be less ava…

I think there is an argument to be made that pretty much the entire health insurance industry is a bullshit industry. It's led to the price of medical care spiralling absurdly high; it spends a lot of the money it siphons out of the process on getting lawmakers to resist removing it from the equation entirely. And when that catastrophic accident or illness comes they will find every excuse they can to avoid paying out.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#180

Post by Animats »

Here's a possible cure for user-facing Government bureaucracy - you should never have to tell the Government something it already knows. This requires that government agencies get their data interconnection act together. Most companies already do this.

It's basically what Salesforce does.

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